The present invention relates broadly to an atomic beam generating apparatus and in particular to a pulsed atomic beam generator apparatus.
In the prior art, there are three basic types of atomic beam generating systems which are currently being utilized. The first type is the effusive nozzle source wherein gaseous material within a heated oven is permitted to escape through a small aperture. A series of apertures and a pumping system are used to collimate the effusing gas into a narrow beam. The effusive source is characterized by a mean free path within the oven greater than the aperture diameter. The second type of atomic beam source also utilizes a heated oven. However, the source gas is expanded through a hypersonic nozzle, thereby obtaining a higher velocity gas stream than is possible with the simple effusive source. The useful beam intensities which are achieved are only in the energy region of less than one electron-volt. Less intense atomic beams having higher energy may be obtained by the third method which uses charge exchange collisions with a static gas to neutralize the high velocity ions that may be obtained from any of a number of ion source types.